Charita Goshay: What’s in a word? Plenty

Saturday

Aug 23, 2008 at 12:01 AMAug 23, 2008 at 10:22 PM

When someone you love is hurt by another’s mean-spiritedness, you’ll do anything to make it stop. Some families of people with developmental disabilities are supporting legislation that would drop the “MR” from MRDD, the Board of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities.

Charita Goshay

When someone you love is hurt by another’s mean-spiritedness, you’ll do anything to make it stop. Some families of people with developmental disabilities are supporting legislation that would drop the “MR” from MRDD, the Board of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities.

Though “mental retardation” is accurate medical terminology, proponents of the change say the term has taken on such a negative connotation, it is beyond redemption. To support their argument, they point to the new comedy film “Tropical Thunder,” which frequently uses the derogatory term “retard.”

A few families have even called for the term “disabilities” to be erased, but that would only foster the misguided notion that there’s something wrong with having a disability.

Change of heart

Years ago, there was a nonsensical stigma attached to people stricken with cancer, as if those afflicted somehow asked for it. In some parts of the world, rape victims are ostracized, even murdered for casting shame upon their families.

For those of us who live in the West, this qualifies as insanity.

Some supporters of the developmentally disabled have likened the name-change issue to the civil rights movement -- but the civil rights movement is a perfect example of how a change in law doesn’t guarantee a change of heart.

Whites who saw nothing wrong with segregated buses and diners didn’t change their minds simply because Jim Crow was sent packing. A deep-rooted sense of superiority doesn’t dissipate upon hearing a chorus of “We Shall Overcome.”

Word police?

Those who dismiss the supporters as “word police” should keep in mind that language is a living organism that constantly changes. We’ve discarded use of such terms as “insane asylum” and “idiot,” and no one is worse for the wear.

Those on the outside looking in have no idea how it feels to see someone you love being gawked at, laughed at, bullied, even feared. Yet, name-change supporters must be realistic. A person’s mindset won’t be transformed by a new logo -- only enlightenment and education can do that. And to imply that a public that supports MRDD services is insensitive by its use of such innocuous terms as “handicapped parking,” or “disabled” is to risk resentment.

It can be tricky. Sometimes, protests only fuel interest in the offending material. When some Christians went ballistic over “The Last Temptation of Christ,” it piqued curiosity about the film and the book on which it was based, giving undeserved credence to a movie so badly miscast, Judas Iscariot had a Brooklyn accent.

Those who deliberately mistreat others because of a disability do so out of fear and ignorance, the twin sisters of prejudice. Dismantling such bias is like planting a seed. You just have to keep faith that, sooner or later, it’s going to take root.